Giants beef up defensive line with South Florida's Pierre-Paul in first round of NFL draft

AP photoSouth Florida's Jason Pierre-Paul, right, sacks Western Kentucky quarterback Brandon Smith during a game last fall. The Giants took the defensive end in the first round of the NFL Draft on Thursday night.

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Coming off their worst defensive season since 1966, the New York Giants didn’t get the middle linebacker everyone was predicting.

They got the freak instead, or should we say — the Freak II.

Calling him a player of uncommon ability oozing with talent, the Giants moved to shore up the defense by taking inexperienced South Florida defensive end Jason Pierre-Paul with the 15th overall pick in the NFL draft on Thursday night.

“We think the guy has the biggest upside of any player in the draft,” said general manager Jerry Reese, who compared Pierre-Paul to former pass-rushing great Javon Kearse, who was known as ’The Freak.’ “That’s how we feel about this guy. We feel the sky is the limit.”

While he only played one season of major college football, Pierre-Paul is an outstanding athlete. The 6-foot-4, 270-pounder has been videotaped countless times doing backflips on the field. But he is more than a gymnast. He had 45 tackles, 6½ sacks and 16½ tackles for losses last season.

“There’s a lot of like about him,” Reese said. “He has things you can’t teach. He is a rare, gifted, talented kid. He is uncommon. That’s a good word to describe his skill set. He is a long. He is fast. He is athletic, tough and has a great motor. We’re excited about having him.”

The Giants lost eight of their final 11 games last season in missing the playoffs for the first time since 2004.

After giving up 427 points, the Giants needed help on defense. Pierre-Paul gives them somewhat of a clone of two-time Pro Bowl defensive end Osi Umenyiora.

“He has some freakish athletic skills that we’re excited about trying to hone and get on a good path toward the quarterback,” Reese said.

Umenyiora ticked off the Giants hierarchy after last season, complaining about his playing time. But Reese shot down any future trade rumors.

“We’re not trading Osi, so you won’t even have ask that question,” Reese said. “I know that is on everybody’s mind.”

The Giants (8-8) came into the draft with their biggest need at middle linebacker. But their hopes of getting someone to replace Antonio Pierce fell apart early when Oakland took Rolando McClain at No. 8.

“This was an easy pick for us,” Reese said.

Giants co-owner John Mara said Pierre-Paul was the highest rated player on their board at the time of the selection.

“If you told me at the beginning of the day that we’d still have him up there when we picked I would have been pretty happy,” Mara said. “We had a big grade on this kid.”

Giants coach Tom Coughlin said the addition of Pierre-Paul gives New York a stable of pass-rushing ends, much like in 2007 when they had Michael Strahan, Justin Tuck, Umenyiora and Mathias Kiwanuka and won the Super Bowl.

Strahan has retired, but Pierre-Paul pushes that number back to four.

“Let’s play,” Coughlin said. “Everybody is going to have a chance to contribute. We didn’t rush the passer well last year. Let’s go back to doing the things we did well a couple of years ago. It’s let’s stop talking and go play.”